Financial Planning for Higher Education Professionals

As of the time of this writing, U.S. equities are down significantly, Japan has been clobbered, bonds are rallying, commodities are selling off, the Volatility Index (also known as the VIX) is flying, headlines are red, the talking heads are talking, and fear is building!

And yet…

Let us take a breath to recognize what, if anything, has changed.

In the last week, humans have, as humans tend to do, created a bit more chaos than normal…but fundamentally, nothing really has changed. Yes, the U.S. presidential election is now closer, and yes, the Japanese Central Bank did a silly thing, and yes, the recent job data is weaker than hoped, and as shocking as Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.’s announcement of his Ursus escapades was…none of them was truly material enough to send markets down as much as they fell. So, what happened?